Fix upcoming for Google Home, Chromecast bug that can tattle on your location

Your trusty Google Home speaker may not be all that trustworthy after all — at least, not for now. Security researcher Craig Young from the firm Tripwire has discovered a bug that allows both the Google Home and the Google Chromecast TV stick to share user location, which needless to say is less than ideal. Apparently, the bug works by exploiting a loophole, and results in cross-checking the wireless networks in the vicinity with Google’s exacting geolocation services.

But don’t worry — this vulnerability won’t be present for long. On Monday, June 18, security expert Brian Krebs reported that Google will fix the location privacy leak “in the coming weeks.” And not a moment too soon — exploiting the bug is apparently quite straightforward, and requires attackers to simply run a script in the background in order to collect location data on anyone with a Google Home or Chromecast installed on their local network. The attacker wouldn’t even need to be connected to your network; they would only need to send you a malicious link, and for you to keep that link open for about a minute while they triangulated your position.

“I’ve only tested this in three environments so far, but in each case the location corresponds to the right street address,” Young told Krebs. “The Wi-Fi based geolocation works by triangulating a position based on signal strengths to Wi-Fi access points with known locations based on reporting from people’s phones.” Although IP-based geolocation is only accurate to about three miles around the compromised device, the method that Young has discovered actually delivers location data to an accuracy of about 30 feet. Young has even produced a demo of the bug in action, which you can check out in the above video.

Krebs notes that Google only agreed to address the issue after he contacted them and informed the team that he would be publishing a piece about the problem. In fact, Young had previously made contact with Google, but the tech giant refused to issue a patch, noting that the geolocation feature was “intended behavior.” Clearly, Google has changed its tune, and now, the fix should go live in mid-July.

Google's Pixel smartphone may be running the latest software, but it still has its fair share of issues. We've rounded up some of the more common Google Pixel problems, along with a few solutions for addressing them.

The iDevices Thermostat now works with voice requests from Google Assistant. Check or set your iDevices Thermostat with questions such as, "Hey Google, what's the thermostat set to?" or "OK Google, set the temperature to 75 degrees."

This device can do a whole lot, from playing music to reading the weather to controlling your smart home devices. We break down how to set up your Google Home so that you can get started your new device.

Samsung aims to change the dishwasher game with its newest model, the DW80M9 Chef Collection model featuring Samsung’s WaterWall technology. But it’s the thoughtful design elements that really make this dishwasher stand out.

Samsung introduced the SmartThings Wifi, an A.I.-based multifunction mesh networking router with an integrated smart home hub. The device intelligently allocates network speed and bandwidth based on device and application needs.

A team of Chinese researchers revealed this week that they were able to use a cracked Amazon Echo to exploit a series of Alexa interface flaws to take control over an unteuched Echo running on the same network.